The Senate should not abandon its work on a truly comprehensive climate and energy package. We need a cap on carbon to reduce emissions and renewables and energy efficiency to reduce the cost of a climate bill.

In fact, finalizing a bill similar to the one the Senate Energy Committee passed in June would take us a step backward. For example, the federal renewable energy standard in the bill -- which ostensibly would require utilities to increase their reliance on renewable energy sources over time – actually wouldn’t deliver any more renewable energy than we would expect without the new standard. It certainly wouldn’t help us significantly reduce the carbon overload in the atmosphere. And if the Senate passes legislation that doesn’t effectively reduce carbon emissions, it would make difficult international climate treaty negotiations even more difficult.

The reality is that renewables and energy efficiency combined with a carbon cap offers the best – and cheapest -- climate solution. Renewables and efficiency work together to reduce the overall cost of a climate bill and create new domestic jobs. In turn, the allowance revenue from a climate bill would generate funds to promote more renewable energy. Such a serious, comprehensive approach is necessary for negotiating a successful international climate treaty.

It won’t be easy to get 60 votes for a comprehensive climate and energy bill, but Sens. John Kerry, Joe Lieberman and Lindsay Graham have established a good process for moving forward. Now they have the committee-passed “Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act” to work from.

Many of the same swing votes that are needed to pass a comprehensive energy and climate bill would also be needed to pass a stand-alone energy bill. Wavering politicians should trust their constituents: The American public overwhelmingly supports moving to a clean energy economy and joining the rest of the world in reducing carbon emissions. They should also listen to climate scientists, who tell us that the task of dramatically reducing carbon emissions becomes even more critical as carbon dioxide stays in our atmosphere longer and the effects of climate change accelerate.

When we look objectively at the science of climate change and the politics of climate policy, there is only one choice: The Senate needs to follow the House and pass a comprehensive bill.

Overbearing partisanship has been the ruin of the ability of our leaders to make proper decisions in a timely manner on some of the most important issues we face.

Such partisanship and group think also seem to be leading us into "two huddles in the muddle" on energy and climate legislation. This is not a true debate, but a simple taking of sides, on the very important issues that we face. The country deserves better.

Can there be benefits to having the energy and climate bills being separated out? That depends on how the final makeup of these separate bills will be. If they work together and there are no contradictions and mixed messages from the two bills that would help. However, if the two bills contradict each other and if they give mixed incentives then separating them out might be worse than keeping them together. However, such cross-bill contradictions can also exist within a bill that includes both climate and energy. It could be a washout either way. One thing to be sure: the results will be far from perfect and there will be lots of ruffled feathers.

If the point in separating them out is to get them done in a certain time frame then we have to seriously consider why there is a rush. If it is to beat the Copenhagen Deadline in order for the US to say that they got something done then we might be trading off short term diplomatic expediency for long term policy returns for the country. We may make things a bit easier in the meetings in Copenhagen, but at the same time reducing the chances for making real positive policy change for a better energy and environment future.

It is important that we have the fullest, most comprehensive and most forward looking policies. This may likely take a lot more time than we have prior to the Copenhagen Deadline or even some upcoming deadlines for elections in the US. Elections drive votes and debates, surely. But the issues being debated are long term problems and these long term problems demand long term solutions. Our leaders need to take the high road to see the long view. The best leaders see this and it would be good if they could lead others to see things this way.

Cap and trade can be a good idea. But it needs to be developed properly. What I have been hearing is a lot of wooly thinking about what the caps might be and what the trading framework might be. Cap and trade markets are by nature somewhat synthetic in many ways, especially in the pricing of the carbon based in what seem arbitrary caps with lots of loopholes.

Also, and I have yet to read a full answer that makes good sense to me from political circles about what exactly are the costs to the US per ton of carbon. Surely there are lots of studies by think tanks and others, but when one digs deeply into their assumptions and more one could see the weaknesses in many of these studies. Furthermore, C02 is a global issue, not just a US issue.

It is clear to me that carbon disequilibria are a major problem. We have been burning hydrocarbons into the atmosphere that were buried for 100s of millions of years until the Industrial Revolution started the rapid acceleration of the burning of coal. Then we later also started to use oil in rapidly accelerated burning for transport, electricity and more. After that we also started to burn more and more natural gas. The atmosphere, given its inherent flexibility, could take this for a while. However, the post-Industrial Revolution carbon disequilibria have increasingly stressed out our atmosphere over time.

Something needs to be done. Energy change is a big part of this, especially given that the major sources of C02 globally and in the US are electricity production and transportation by burning fossil fuels. Energy issues and climate issues are intertwined. The energy-environment nexus is nonlinear and complex, and sometimes unpredictable. We need to do something smart and long lasting, not just something that is politically and diplomatically expedient. We also should not make the solutions worse than the problems.

With unemployment above 10 percent and poised to go even higher, Congress’ time would be best spent on anything other than these expensive, economically harmful energy policies. Asking whether the Senate should stop trying to pass Kerry-Boxer to focus on an alternative package is like asking Americans if they prefer to have their wallets stolen or be robbed at the ATM. Whether it is cap-and-trade or a nationwide renewable electricity mandate, the result is the same: these plans will hurt American families. After all, in order for these policies to work as the proponents intend them to, they must significantly increase the cost of the energy we currently use to heat our homes, fill our gas tanks and run our businesses.

Studies from EPA, EIA, Brookings, MIT, and others all agree that cap-and-trade will reduce GDP and kill American jobs. This is an unavoidable outcome of artificially increasing the price carbon based energy. The American people want job security and improved economic conditions. Cap-and-trade legislation will do just the opposite.

The same is true of a nationwide renewable electricity mandate. Forcing ratepayers to use less efficient and more expensive sources of energy will, quite obviously, increase electricity rates and disproportionately hurt certain regions of the country. They’re also, in many cases, duplicative. Already, 35 states have imposed their own renewable electricity mandate or goal. States are obviously free to enact these costly mandates and have regularly done so without federal intervention.

Lastly, it is not clear what Senator Graham hopes to achieve with his alliance with Senator Kerry. Senator Graham claims to want to improve access to offshore oil and gas production, but the OCS is already open. The hold-up is the Obama Administration’s stalling of the regulatory process, not a lack of Congressional authorization. Their policies are also holding up new investments in nuclear power, in coal mining and new generation coal plants, and refineries are closing while they are opening around the world.

“Can efforts by Kerry, Lieberman, and Graham save climate change legislation?” For the good for everyday hard working Americans and our future economic opportunity, let’s hope not.

AGA’s position on climate change legislation is that our legislators can reach our nation’s energy goals sooner by recognizing the important role that clean, efficient and domestically abundant natural gas can and must play in combating climate change.

Regardless of whether or not Congress passes a comprehensive climate bill, there are several important issues that it could address right now to help lower emissions and save energy.

Congress should expand the existing Federal Trade Commission EnergyGuide labeling program for home appliances to include carbon footprint information. Clearly explaining the true carbon impact of major appliance purchases will allow consumers to make informed decisions about their own carbon footprints. The labels would also help consumers choose appliances that have the lowest total environmental impact by giving them a way to compare across fuel types.

Congress should also support the implementation of full-fuel-cycle measurement, which is the most accurate way to calculate energy consumption and carbon emissions of home appliances. Right now, efficiency ratings only consider energy consumption at the point of end use, such as the burner tip and electric outlet, and fail to take into account energy lost in the production, generation, transmission and distribution processes. Using this more accurate method, natural gas is far more efficient than either electricity or fuel oil.

AGA also supports the development of cost effective building codes and standards, in particular the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) approach of developing and implementing building energy codes and standards based on source energy use. EPA has clearly stated that source energy is the best common unit of measurement to capture a building’s efficiency because it represents the total amount of raw fuel that is required to operate the building. According to the EPA, “source energy incorporates all transmission, delivery and production losses, thereby enabling a complete assessment of energy efficiency in a building.”

If Congress is serious about taking measurable and meaningful steps to achieve a carbon-neutral future, these are three smart and easy ones with which to start. Any legislation looking for bipartisan support, whether or not it includes a cap-and-trade provision, should reflect the large and growing role that natural gas can play in that future.

Substance aside, the process was enough to kill the climate bill in the EPW Committee. Climate legislation will require support from both sides of the aisle, but the only bipartisan feature of that bill was the opposition to it. It’s past time to start discussing what comes next.

It’s important to act on climate change – but it’s more important to get it right. To develop a policy that balances environmental progress with economic strength, we must fully account for both goals at the outset.

This will take time – perhaps more than some would like – but it doesn’t mean that progress can’t be made. Before the end of the year, the full Senate should consider and pass the bipartisan energy bill approved by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

Some are concerned that we need the energy bill to be part of a climate bill to provide the necessary “lift” for the climate portion. I hold we need to develop a climate bill that has sufficient merit to pass on its own. The Senate energy bill does not contain a price on carbon that many feel is so important. It would, however, significantly reduce our nation’s emissions without threatening our already fragile economy. As long as the energy bill remains on hold, we’ll continue to forgo its potential benefits.

While cap-and-trade proposals considered thus far have laid claim to greater greenhouse gas reductions, they have also been universally shown to come at an untenable price in these difficult economic times. It’s becoming apparent that incremental progress on climate change is more achievable than attempting to get an economy-wide program enacted in one fell swoop. It will take time legislatively, technologically and internationally to complete such a complicated endeavor.

Unlike the Kerry-Graham effort, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has produced an actual bill with bipartisan support. While my colleagues’ statements and actions are commendable, it will take time to translate their good intentions into legislative text and more still to determine whether or not their bill can garner enough support to pass the Senate. It took our committee more than five months and 11 markups to complete the energy bill. More than 100 amendments were considered, and yet we did not allow the process to bog down in partisanship.

As apparent as it has become that the Kerry-Boxer bill cannot pass the full Senate, legislation developed outside the jurisdictional confines of a committee system has not fared much better in the past either. Proposed immigration reform was developed through a model similar to that which Sens. Kerry and Graham are pursuing. Our immigration policies remain unchanged.

High gasoline prices last summer gave rise to a “Gang of 20” that sought energy production on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). That effort never led to the writing of a bill, let alone consideration of one by the full Senate. Ultimately, many of the Gang’s objectives were ironically achieved through legislative inaction as Congress allowed an OCS moratorium to expire and President Bush eliminated a similar executive prohibition. All that’s missing now is the political will to provide revenue sharing to states outside the Gulf Coast, finalize and implement a five-year plan, and centralize all OCS permitting with the Minerals Management Service.

My concerns about these past efforts notwithstanding, they were at least bipartisan. Legislation to address global climate change this Congress has taken the opposite approach. This has resulted in an over simplification of an incredibly complex policy matter – either you support an introduced climate bill, or you’re against protecting the environment. This perception ignores the fact that senators from both parties are concerned about the protection of our environment and the strength of our nation’s economy. I applaud Sens. Kerry and Graham for reminding people of this fact.

Proponents of a cap-and-trade bill believe that passing a standalone energy bill would be a sign of the Senate’s inability to act on global climate change. I disagree. You cannot utilize remote, renewable energy resources unless you can string transmission wires to those areas; you cannot raise capital for clean technology investments unless the impediments to borrowing are reduced; you cannot, indeed should not, simply eliminate conventional resources from our energy portfolio; and you cannot reduce the amount of energy that must be produced in the first place unless efficiency is improved. The Senate energy bill tackles all of these issues and many more. We can have a positive impact on the environment and the economy by adopting that legislation now, while continuing to develop climate policies in preparation for a much-needed debate on a bill – that can actually pass the Senate – next year.

A year ago the strategy of two separate packages made sense – given the amount of time required to build consensus regarding climate, energy legislation could have moved as a high priority on a separate and faster track in the first half of 2009. A renewable energy standard had broad support and could have served as an early stage “down payment” on climate. An energy bill also would have allowed more time and attention for important questions such as how to get a more robust transmission infrastructure built in this country.

But that was last year. There is a limited legislative window available to get things done before the 2010 elections. At this point it is essential that the U.S. put in place a clear, Congressionally-approved climate policy, and with the mid-term elections next year that policy must be in place no later than the spring of 2010. Given the limited floor time available, it is foolish to think two different packages could be achieved within such a relatively short time, and it is clear that policies such as a renewable energy standard and cap-and-trade are in fact complementary and can be addressed in one package.

It is encouraging to see Kerry, Graham and Lieberman stepping forward to try to forge a middle ground on climate. It will not be easy, but such a broad collaborative approach is essential to getting agreement on climate in the Senate.

Any sensible plan to develop an innovative low-carbon, clean energy economy needs four elements:

1) An investment strategy to develop, scale and bring down the price of new clean energy technologies.

2) A set of market reforms designed to ensure that cost-effective clean energy solutions are not slowed down or denied market access by institutional barriers or the resistance of incumbent energy sector players with assets invested in the fossil fuel sector.

3) Incentives or mandates to accelerate market deployment of new, clean energy technologies to overcome the inertia created by the enormous current investments in high carbon energy sources.

4) A way to pay for 1-3.

The idea of somehow separating legislation dealing with climate from legislation dealing with energy reform is, looked at through this lens, simply preposterous. It is impossible for Congress to figure out which market reforms, incentives and mandates are cost-effective unless Congress knows how fast we plan to decarbonize our economy. Taking up climate later leaves such awkward questions as “what do we do about very high carbon, dirty, but geographically close energy sources like Canada’s tar sands?” If you leave climate out, it is almost irresistible for Congress to postpone the single most important climate question -- how to clean up the carbon emissions from coal.

Separating these legislative efforts means – almost certainly – creating two different payment mechanisms, and it is the payment mechanism which is politically most controversial part of this legislation. Several of the most likely candidates as incentives in a climate bill --- whether cap and trade, cap and rebate, oil imports limits or a carbon tax – could also serve as important financial mechanisms for energy sector technology development and market incentives. And without taking climate into account, we will almost certainly fritter away the opportunity to think strategically about how to combine strategies like tropic forest protection with clean energy deployment – we need both, we need them both quickly, but we need for them to work in harness.

Those who want to take up climate later because they don’t like cap and trade ought to offer their alternative – not for consideration later, but as part of the mix in this Congress – because we are almost certainly going to design a better climate+energy bill than separate climate and energy bills taken up by two different Congresses.

Members of Congress may not like to cast tough votes. That’s what we pay them to do – not in my personal opinion enough – but they did apply for the job.

We thank Senator Graham for his courageous effort to break the partisan gridlock on energy and climate legislation, and very much hope that his work with Senators Kerry and Lieberman proves successful.

We continue to support passage of a comprehensive energy and climate bill and to urge that it include a strong renewable electricity standard (RES) that will provide the certainty businesses need to invest billions of dollars in America and create hundreds of thousands of jobs

In doing so, we note:

1) The public overwhelmingly supports clean renewable energy. This was confirmed most recently just last week with the report of a Sooner Survey conducted in the state of Oklahoma. It found that fully 91 percent of respondents "approve of the further development of wind power for producing Oklahoma's needed electricity." Furthermore, In fact, Oklahomans are so supportive of using wind power that they break against their normal antiregulation and anti-mandate sentiments: 67% favor a requirement that 20% of the nation’s electricity needs be met with wind power by the year 2025.

2) The U.S. is currently paying the price for 30 years of neglect of energy policy. This year, China will install more new wind generation capacity than any other country in the world--a position the U.S. held just last year. Other countries with strong national commitments to renewable energy are reaping the benefits in increased domestic energy production and jobs.

The global wind power industry is currently building out its factories and supply chain, and making decisions where new manufacturing facilities will be located. We have a world-class wind resource and a once-in-a-generation opportunity to build the market that will bring those facilities and the jobs they create to America. Now is the time to seize that opportunity and make our nation a global leader in clean, renewable energy by passing comprehensive energy and climate legislation with a strong RES.

Simply put, the cap's the thing. Doing an energy bill without directly addressing our global warming pollution would miss the point of why we’re addressing the issue in the first place. Putting a limit (and with it, a price) on our global warming pollution will send a vastly clearer signal to the market than floating a raft of subsidies and hoping the folks downstream get the message.

I’d also take issue with your contention that clean energy & climate legislation needs “saving.” In the House, the American Clean Energy & Security Act got more Republican support than the heath insurance reform bill and economic recovery package combined. That was despite a massive campaign against it led by major polluters. And just last year, similar legislation earned the support of 54 senators despite opposition from President Bush. With President Obama’s support and a bipartisan path to the finish line, we have reason to be confident.

The National Wildlife Federation is confident Senators Kerry, Graham and Lieberman – with the support & guidance of Senators Reid and Boxer – will shepherd this historic legislation to passage.

If there was important energy legislation that could be passed and should be passed soon, it would make sense to separate energy from cap and trade. However, Washington has already generated two comprehensive pieces if energy legislation in the last four years. And since those policy acts included steps to increase investment in nuclear power, research and development in energy technology, improvements in energy efficiency and alternative energy, it is unclear what pressing energy needs must still be met by this Congress.

Legislation to encourage more domestic oil exploration is important to slow the growth in imports and increase domestic investment that will create good paying jobs here instead of other countries. Yet, the Senate leadership seems to be long on talk about reducing dependence on insecure sources of oil and short on action to actually accomplish it. On the other hand, those same Congressmen are taking great strides to use this next energy bill to increase renewable energy requirements -- a move that will simply drive up the cost of electricity and increase subsidy requirements for energy systems that are not cost-competitive.

The Senate would serve the best energy interests of the American public better if it re-examined how well the Energy Policy Acts of 2005 and 2007 were working and then took corrective action where they aren’t. One form of corrective action involves making sure that the Executive Branch has moved swiftly to implement past legislative requirements especially with respect to leasing, improving the grid, and deploying improved energy technologies.

The question of splitting climate reforms and the energy package comes down to how urgent we consider passing the energy provisions, since it’s clear that the Senate will not enact Kerry-Boxer or any other cap-and-trade system this year. In politics, it’s usually better to take a half loaf than none; but since the other half of this loaf is the most important part, it comes down to whether climate reforms can pass without energy reforms. The answer to that question is more complicated than it seems, since the hard truth is that Congress is very unlikely to ever pass a cap-and-trade system. One reason is that economists have pointed out how a cap-and-trade system inevitably makes energy prices much more volatile, as it has in Europe. Beyond people’s predictable reactions to even more volatile energy prices than today, businesses won’t undertake the huge investments required to develop more climate-friendly fuels and technologies unless they can project their returns based on a stable price for carbon. Cap-and-trade is also so complicated that it’s been easy to encrust it with crippling, special-interest exemptions and “offsets,” a phenomenon observed equally in the European Trading Scheme and the House-passed Waxman-Markey bill. The first priority, therefore, should be to open up the debate to a “Plan B” that doesn’t have cap-and-trade’s serious drawbacks. Let’s start with what has worked well in Scandinavia -- a carbon-based tax, but one in which we also protect the economy by recycling the revenues in other forms of tax relief. If we can get that debate going, we may not have to pick and choose between climate and energy reforms.

The old Midas television commercial summarizes it all right now with regard to U.S. energy policy: “you can pay us now or pay us later.” Every day that the United States puts off passing strong science-based climate legislation the more expensive the final bill will be, and the more damage human beings and the natural environment will suffer. This is not to say that strong energy legislation that ramps up investment in renewable energy is not a good idea. It is (and will create many long-term sustainable job opportunities as an added bonus). But the Senate Energy and Natural Resources energy bill is flawed, and passing any energy bill without significantly reducing greenhouse pollutants simultaneously would be a tremendous missed opportunity. Even the Kerry-Boxer climate bill that passed out of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee has several debilitating flaws: first it does not set science-based pollution reduction standards (i.e., anything remotely close to 350 or even 450 ppm of CO2), second it does not aggressively go after methane reductions despite the technological ability to do so today at basically no cost, and third it waives the very portion of the Clean Air Act (i.e., the National Ambient Air Quality Standards or NAAQS) that could actually provide the tool to achieve science-based standards in a familiar way to various levels of government. So as we consider pouring literally hundreds of billions of dollars into the coal industry, offshore oil drilling and new nuclear investment with current legislative proposals, shouldn’t the taxpayer ask: is this going to get the job done on global warming? It isn’t victory merely because the President signs a bill that says “climate” (or “energy”) in it. But that cynical scenario is where we are headed without true leadership by our elected political leaders. And the fossil fuel industry knows it.

Climate should go first for 3 reasons: 1) coincidence with clean domestic energy, 2) international credibility, and 3) inherent simplicity. Simple cap and trade might be something as follows: 83% cut by 2050 from large electric & industrial sources - with 2/3 to 3/4 auctioned and free pro-rata allocation (to emitters) in the early years. Energy policy is more complicated (note: 1426 pages of HR2454 avoided most real energy decisions). There should be 3 core components to an energy bill: transportation policy & fuel taxes, electric power supply, and electric power distribution (including incentives for utility agents to support individual and national energy productivity). Kerry, Graham, and Lieberman have stepped boldly into a void created by "kitchen sink" legislative alternatives and Executive branch silence. They can succeed.